“No, I think not,” said Markham. “And I’ll take the kitchen floor for granted.—Now, can we look at the second floor?”
We ascended the main stairs, which led round a piece of marble statuary—a Falguière figure, I think—, and emerged into the upper hall facing the front of the house where three large close-set windows looked out over the bare trees.
The arrangement of the rooms on the second floor was simple and in keeping with the broad four-square architecture of the house; but for the sake of clarification I am embodying in this record a rough diagram of it; for it was the disposition of these rooms that made possible the carrying out of the murderer’s hideous and unnatural plot.
There were six bedrooms on the floor—three on either side of the hall, each occupied by a member of the family. At the front of the house, on our left, was the bedroom of Rex Greene, the younger brother. Next to it was the room occupied by Ada Greene; and at the rear were Mrs. Greene’s quarters, separated from Ada’s by a fair-sized dressing-room through which the two apartments communicated. It will be seen from the diagram that Mrs. Greene’s room projected beyond the main western elevation of the house, and that in the L thus formed was a small balustraded stone porch with a narrow flight of stairs, set against the house, leading to the lawn below. French doors opened upon this porch from both Ada’s and Mrs. Greene’s rooms.
Plan of second floor. (For the sake of simplification all bathrooms, clothes-closets, fireplaces, etc., have been omitted.)
On the opposite side of the hall were the three rooms occupied by Julia, Chester, and Sibella, Julia’s room being at the front of the house, Sibella’s at the rear, and Chester’s in the centre. None of these rooms communicated with the other. It might also be noted that the doors to Sibella’s and Mrs. Greene’s rooms were just behind the main staircase, whereas Chester’s and Ada’s were directly at the head of the stairs, and Julia’s and Rex’s farther toward the front of the house. There was a small linen closet between Ada’s room and Mrs. Greene’s; and at the rear of the hall were the servants’ stairs.
Chester Greene explained this arrangement to us briefly, and then walked up the hall to Julia’s room.
“You’ll want to look in here first, I imagine,” he said, throwing open the door. “Nothing’s been touched—police orders. But I can’t see what good all that stained bed-linen is to any one. It’s a frightful mess.”
The room was large and richly furnished with sage-green satin-upholstered furniture of the Marie Antoinette period. Opposite to the door was a canopied bedstead on a dais; and several dark blotches on the embroidered linen gave mute evidence of the tragedy that had been enacted there the night before.